Antifreeze recycling

Our application of antifreeze recycling technology

"We have been using the RALEX® ART technology from MEGA for about 3 years. The advantage of the whole technology is its simple operation and easy maintenance. The output can be used to produce a new antifreeze mixture of the same quality as the virgin glycol product."

Ing. Jan Skolil, Ph.D.
Technical director CLASSIC OIL s.r.o.

What is antifreeze

Due to its chemical properties, antifreeze has numerous industrial applications. The low pour point of ethylene glycol/propylene glycol allows its use as an antifreeze in automotive applications, where it is used to protect the engine from freezing and at the same time to protect against corrosion.

It is also used as a de-icing fluid for vehicle windows and for de-icing aircrafts at airports.

Ethylene glycol is also often used in the water circuits of HVAC (heating, ventilation, air conditioning) air conditioning systems.

RALEX® ART - Antifreeze Reuse Technology

RALEX® Antifreeze Reuse Technology is a comprehensive solution that integrates pretreatment with desalination phase electrodialysis. The aim is to treat the glycol solutions used and to form a mixture of pure glycol and water for further use in the production of antifreeze fluids.

The technology is intended for the regeneration of antifreeze solutions from automotive, heating and air-conditioning, capacitor electrolyte recycling, and used de-icing solutions of aircraft wastewater.

Benefits of using antifreeze recycling technology from MEGA

• Unique ecological, economical and technical approach.
• Competitive OpEx and CapEx.
• Complex tailor-made technology.
• Purified product matching ASTM D3306-19 norm.
• Technology suitable for concentration ranges from 15 to 50 % glycol concentration.
• The final product can be reused in antifreeze mixtures production.

How does the RALEX® ART work

Ralex® ART consists of practical pretreatment step and highly efficient electrodialysis step to gain a mixture of water and clean glycol while retaining low energy and chemical consumption.

The pretreatment step could contain oil removal, simple filtration, active carbon and coagulation step, and deep filtration. The following step, desalination, is made by electrodialysis technology. Electrodialysis task is removing organic and inorganic salts.

The final product is an aqueous solution of glycols or glycerol with a significantly reduced content of impurities and original additives (conductivity less than 0.3 mS/cm). The purified desalinated glycol can be used as antifreeze again after the additives are added.

Electrodialysis in the glycol separation process

Electrodialysis is an electrochemical separation process in which ions from the treated liquid are transferred by ion exchange membranes from one solution to another under the influence of DC voltage. The charged components are attracted to the cathode or anode and collected in the concentrate stream.

Electrodialysis technology has been fully developed from membranes to units by company MEGA since 1985. We have over 30 years of experience in industrial and environmental applications of membrane separation.